A Hilarious Guide to Texting for the Elderly

Texting can be difficult to master, especially for people who grew up communicating through snail mail and tin can phones. Yes, we’re talking about elderly people. Sure, Grandma and Grandpa are trying to be all hip with their smartphones, but do they really understand the subtleties of texting?

Probably — they’re pretty smart, you know — but that didn’t stop Conan O’Brien from offering a handy set of tips to help older folks adopt more quickly to this newfangled thing called texting. Enjoying the technology experience allows the older people in your life to send you on a guilt trip without ever looking you in the eye.

Watch the video above and let us know in the comments what are some other tech lessons you’d like to teach Great Aunt Sally.

BONUS: When Parents Text: 15 Funniest Picks

When Parents Text

1. Flip Phone

2. Farm Cats

3. Chocolate Chip

4. Facebook Cornucopia

5. Mrs. Batman

6. Foursquare Champ

7. WWF

8. Human?

9. Texting Partner

10. Facebook Like

11. Two Person Flash Mob

12. Background Mix-Up

13. 21st Century Parenting

14. Condom Cat

15. Tacos for Dinner – Part One

Our final two slides show the text conversation that inspired When Parents Text. Sophia Fraioli tells Mashable how it all began:

“Lauren and I had both just moved back to our hometowns, in with our parents after graduating college.

“One night over dinner, Lauren showed me a particular funny text, where a misunderstanding about train times had led her mom to believe she wanted seven tacos for dinner.

“I read it, started hysterically laughing and said, ‘When parents text, it’s hilarious.’ Lauren immediately followed with, ‘That should be a website.’ The next day we started a Tumblr blog.”